In Which Harrowhark Learns the Location of the Staff of Magnus

More mage college action here, running Mzulft, and then returning to the college and witnessing the death of the Arch-Mage!

Play by play

• Play date: 1/17/2023
• Session number in this run: 22
• Picked up just outside Mzulft
• Ran the place pretty much as usual though more easily with party of four
• Started throwing Soul Trap around since I don’t have a weapon with the enchantment yet
• Threw frost atronach and the boys at the centurion
• Overloaded by then but made it to Paratus Decimius and the final chamber
• Had to remind myself how to focus the damn thing as per usual, but finally got it set
• Paratus flipped out about what we were storing at the college; took my leave
• Got new vision saying “get back to the college right now”
• Got out, but could not fast travel, because overloaded
• Climbed back down to where the horses were
• Hit the storeroom to clear it out and get the aetherium shard while I was in there
• Mounted up, and boinged to Windhelm
• Sold a bunch of things to Oengul (including all the dwarven metal ingots and general metal scraps) and Niranye (dwemer pots and things)
• Told Aventus Grelod was dead to resolve his quest
• Went back out to horses because still overloaded
• Mounted up and boinged to Winterhold; sold a few more things to Birna
• Came back out and got courier with the note from the Brotherhood
• Also saw Valdimar had unequipped the dragonscale again; made him reequip it
• Went up to the college to report in, and all hell broke loose
• OHNOEZ Ancano is taking over the Eye!
• OHNOEZ the Arch-Mage is dead!
• OHNOEZ Winterhold has magic anomalies!
• Team Dragonborn + Faralda and Arniel went down to handle the problem
• Then I tromped back up to report to Mirabelle (still overloaded!) and told her I’m going to Labyrinthian
• She gave me the torc and the amulet
• Went back down to Winterhold to mount up
• Boinged to Myrwatch since close to Labyrinthian, and I needed to unload a bunch of stuff
• Valdimar unequipped the dragonscale again
• Made him put it back on one more time, and also gave him some of the better weapons I was carrying, and the Daedric arrows from the centurion in Mzulft
• Put extraneous armor on mannequins, and Iron Shield of Blocking on a shield rack
• Racked extraneous weapons
• Practiced with the mortar and pestle I had, to confirm yep! Portable alchemy! Awesome!
• Saved there for the night

Commentary

Nothing here in terms of new action, since this was pretty much all mage college stuff, but a few items of note.

One: Mzulft was almost leisurely, going in there with three followers! Even when fighting the centurion towards the end. Which threw a big ol’ steam attack at us, but I threw a frost atronach at it, and was legit surprised by how fast the centurion actually went down.

Two: Decided to go ahead and proceed with the conclusion of Innocence Lost and queue up getting kidnapped by Astrid. And by extension, commencing the Dark Brotherhood plot. Since I did bother to install the Dark Brotherhood for Good Guys mod in the first place, I do want to check it out properly.

I’ll have to think about how the headcanon of this will work, once Astrid finally nabs me. And I’ll want to see whether the boys follow me to the Abandoned Shack. I’m kind of thinking of a situation to the effect of “do this work for us or we will go after your people”. Maybe Harrow thinks she has to go leave her followers alone again for a while?

Three: Valdimar keeps unequipping his gear! Son, if you’re going to keep switching off the dragonscale, I’m going to have to take it back from you. I’m not going to have you carrying it around if you don’t want to wear it. (Internet searching suggests this happens fairly regularly with followers in general, not just Valdimar, and it appears to be related to fast travel? I just haven’t seen it much…)

Four: Myrwatch proved very useful at the end of this session, just as a waystation to unload stuff and prepare for a long jaunt through Labyrinthian!

Next time

Yep, queued up for Labyrinthian! Which I’m hoping will hold to the pattern of “easier than usual with a large group”. Particularly once I finally make it to Morokei.

Depending on time, I may then go back to Morthal and buy the land for Windstad Manor. I do think I want to scale down from three followers; three is a bit much. But I want Windstad set up so I can send Valds there to patrol the place, when I make him stand down from active duty.

I think I’ll hold off a bit on sleeping in a bed just because I want to finish the College of Winterhold plot before I take on being a member of the Dark Brotherhood. And heh, that might actually play into the headcanon a bit, too. The Brotherhood could drop a big hint at Harrow: “nice college staff you have there, be a shame if something were to happen to them”.

Screenshots

Editing to add

• 11/25/2023: Restored missing gallery.